Former Anon spokesman Barrett Brown copping a federal guilty plea

Constitutional showdown over hyperlinking ends.

The former self-proclaimed spokesman for the hacking group Anonymous has agreed to plead guilty in federal court and end a 16-month-long legal tussle that at one time carried wide-ranging implications involving the First Amendment right to post permalinks.

Barrett Brown, 32, was indicted in Texas federal court in December 2012 on several counts, including accusations that he posted a link from one Internet relay chat channel, called #Anonops, to another channel under his control, called #ProjectPM. The link led to private data that had been hijacked from intelligence firm Strategic Forecasting, or Stratfor.

Over time, the authorities dropped most of the charges, which included identity theft and possession of stolen credit card numbers. The hyperlinking charge was also dismissed, setting aside a high-profile constitutional battle over posting links.

Federal prosecutors lodged a superseding indictment (PDF) Monday accusing Brown of obstruction and of assisting an unnamed Stratfor hacker avoid police detection. Court documents (PDF) did not say which charges Brown was pleading to, but he likely faces a maximum 5-year term. No sentencing date has been set.

Brown was one of the most public faces of the Anonymous group. He said he abandoned the group in 2011, when many members of the hacker collective distanced themselves from Brown.

David Kravets
The senior editor for Ars Technica. Founder of TYDN fake news site. Technologist. Political scientist. Humorist. Dad of two boys. Been doing journalism for so long I remember manual typewriters with real paper. Emaildavid.kravets@arstechnica.com//Twitter@dmkravets

How much time would he be facing if he did not make a deal? I'm guessing they were threatening him with some serious time. Extortion with years to keep a high conviction rate is bs and should be illegal..

He was told by Fidel Castro to shun needles that could be in the hands of one of the many people he hugged, ever so tiny. They tried this shit on ol' Fidel and he was wiser, every.single.time.

Can't help but feel sympathy for Cuba, my country never severed relations with it, we're not big babies. Also, they have amazing education systems and medicine schools. People from the US fly to Canada, to fly to Cuba, where we traditionally do not stamp the passport of Americans doing so to pay for top tier surgery over there. Sure there's no oligarchs and billionaires in Cuba...is that such a bad thing?

There's this documentary I saw about people in Cuba all helping each other in neighborhoods, this guy had a broken tv remote control and he freely visited all of his neighbours and they all tried to help him fix it until it worked, they're really good at steampunkin' and people aren't intellectually lazy or fat (nor starving). Benevolent dictator > Broken democratic republic...

So in other words, they're so extremely destitute, that a remote control is such an exotic and rare device, a whole neighborhood must be rallied to save the man from his deprivation of it?

I have about a dozen older remotes that still work that I would be happy to donate to Cubans who need remotes. For the vast majority of Americans who just don't know because our news media doesn't actually inform us - Cuba has a very highly regarded healthcare system. In many ratings it scores higher than the US.

So in other words, they're so extremely destitute, that a remote control is such an exotic and rare device, a whole neighborhood must be rallied to save the man from his deprivation of it?

I have about a dozen older remotes that still work that I would be happy to donate to Cubans who need remotes. For the vast majority of Americans who just don't know because our news media doesn't actually inform us - Cuba has a very highly regarded healthcare system. In many ratings it scores higher than the US.

Being single-payer fully socialized, it scores very well on consumer cost and access. For higher tech surgeries and treatments it does not rank very well, unless you rank high enough to score a Russian doctor.

How much time would he be facing if he did not make a deal? I'm guessing they were threatening him with some serious time. Extortion with years to keep a high conviction rate is bs and should be illegal..

Who takes deals when they know they won't be convicted of the more serious charges? People taking deals are pretty sure they are going to get convicted and get a lot less lenience than if they don't plead out.

They aren't being extorted, they're being offered a chance at some leniency by reducing the public's costs & PITA to formally prove the screw up they know they made.

While I agree that American democracy is fscked (especially in light of recent supreme court decisions), it would be a stretch to call Castro a "benevolent" dictator. Cuba is believed to have the second highest incarceration rate in the world (behind North Korea and just above the US); we don't really know because they don't let the international community in to check (NK is the only other such country). Plus, I don't know too many people who have risked death on a raft to flee the US, which seems to be pretty common in Cuba.

So in other words, they're so extremely destitute, that a remote control is such an exotic and rare device, a whole neighborhood must be rallied to save the man from his deprivation of it?

I have about a dozen older remotes that still work that I would be happy to donate to Cubans who need remotes. For the vast majority of Americans who just don't know because our news media doesn't actually inform us - Cuba has a very highly regarded healthcare system. In many ratings it scores higher than the US.

Being single-payer fully socialized, it scores very well on consumer cost and access. For higher tech surgeries and treatments it does not rank very well, unless you rank high enough to score a Russian doctor.

I met a fascinating guy -- he had been a neurologist in Cuba. His family, I think there was a Sephardim connection a long time ago, moved from New York City to Cuba in 1962 to support the revolution. He grew up and became a medical doctor, and believed 100% in the ideals of the Revolution. At some point after 1989 he experienced a conversion experience, the veils fell from before his eyes and he moved to Switzerland where I met him in 2000.

Who takes deals when they know they won't be convicted of the more serious charges? People taking deals are pretty sure they are going to get convicted and get a lot less lenience than if they don't plead out.

They aren't being extorted, they're being offered a chance at some leniency by reducing the public's costs & PITA to formally prove the screw up they know they made.

There are reasons to take a plea deal that have nothing to do with guilt or innocence. Public defenders don't have the greatest reputation, and private defense is expensive. Even being found not guilty can result in decades of debt and 5 years in a minimum security lockup, or even probation, can be attractive.

So extortion might be too strong a word, but I wouldn't always call it justice either.

He was told by Fidel Castro to shun needles that could be in the hands of one of the many people he hugged, ever so tiny. They tried this shit on ol' Fidel and he was wiser, every.single.time.

Can't help but feel sympathy for Cuba, my country never severed relations with it, we're not big babies. Also, they have amazing education systems and medicine schools. People from the US fly to Canada, to fly to Cuba, where we traditionally do not stamp the passport of Americans doing so to pay for top tier surgery over there. Sure there's no oligarchs and billionaires in Cuba...is that such a bad thing?

There's this documentary I saw about people in Cuba all helping each other in neighborhoods, this guy had a broken tv remote control and he freely visited all of his neighbours and they all tried to help him fix it until it worked, they're really good at steampunkin' and people aren't intellectually lazy or fat (nor starving). Benevolent dictator > Broken democratic republic...

"amazing education systems and medical schools" ? Hahahaha -- what delusional nonsense! Their "doctors" have the equivalent of a high school education and are paid $20 a month. They're the equivalent of door-to-door hygeine workers with some midwifery training, at best. Their education systems are second to none allright---literally, the second step above "nothing."

Saying it's so doesn't make it so, even if you can go to prison (over there) for saying it ain't so.

Anonymous is just that - AntiSec, LulzSec, whateverelsehavyou, especially anyone with a 'spokesperson,' are simply edgy teenagers taking the name of other groups with no knowledge of the associated culture.

How much time would he be facing if he did not make a deal? I'm guessing they were threatening him with some serious time. Extortion with years to keep a high conviction rate is bs and should be illegal..

As another post pointed out, the deals are basically legit. The actual problem is that prosecutors have this huge array of largely redundant laws to throw at people. We need to just clean out most of our laws and regulations.